The Ethical Attitude: A Husserlian Account of Striving to Be a Good Person

The phenomenological notion of attitude has gained new traction in recent years, as it proliferates beyond its initial distinction between natural and phenomenological attitudes, notably to describe multiple meanings to critique and reflection. In this paper, I present an account of the concept of an ethical attitude in Husserlian phenomenology. First, I argue that the ethical attitude is best understood as a practical orientation toward personal life as a whole: someone strives to become the best possible person through self-reflection, self-variation, the renewal of values and ends, and resolve. Second, I interpret Husserl’s accounts of the ethical reduction and the practical neutrality modification through the notion of the ethical attitude. This allows me to elaborate on questions of motivation for striving to be a good person, even if the world seems inhospitable to that effort. The question of the motivation for the ethical attitude reveals that Husserl grappled with existential and theological issues, including the valuelessness of existence, the problem of contingency, and the idea of God. Ultimately, interpreting Husserl’s ethical writings through the notion of the ethical attitude brings together several aspects of his ethics, thereby clarifying the many senses of critique and reflection at play in ethical and social life.